Cor mio se per dolore

This delightful canzonetta for SSB voices, Cor mio se per dolore, opens with a sense of plaintive yearning. The music beautifully captures the text's lament of a lover whose heart aches with such pain that he wishes to die, yet cannot because love itself prevents it. The composer, Antonio Morsolino, uses the intimate forces of three female voices to express this bittersweet sorrow. The texture is often imitative, with voices weaving around each other, mirroring the lover's conflicted emotions as he finds himself unable to forget the object of his affection, despite the pain it brings. It's a charming example of Italian secular part-music from the period.